Learning in an Open Participatory

In order to have an open participatory community, the community must first learn the value of sharing information. Sharing information is crucial because it has been proven that we learn more from each other, rather than textbook reading. Educators see shared learning in the classroom among their students all the time (especially during turn and talk sessions or peer tutoring/mentoring). It seems ironic that our students are more than willing to share their information with their peers, while educators continue to hold firm to a two-year old mentality "its mine all mine" (as stated by David Wiley-Open Education and the Future of Openness). Wiley's use of the 4-R's (reuse, redistribute, revise and remix) is an excellent recipe for spreading information all over the world. The 4-R's is like a snowball effect, it starts off small but grows bigger and stronger as more and more people lay hands on it to keep it moving. In the words of Thomas Jefferson "He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me", simply put we can all increase our awareness together without leaving anybody behind.

If we take advance of the technology we have today, tomorrow textbook learning could become obsolete. Online education would increase all over the world, where students all over the world would be part of the same online classroom. Global sharing would help countries better understand each other, with the possibility of soothing foreign policies.

Think back to colonial America, people struggled to get information out and receive information. For example, Andrew Jackson continued to fight a war that had been declared over; slavery continued in Texas about 2 years after the Emancipation Proclamation was signed. We need to take advantage of the technology we have today, to make a stronger tomorrow.